Fourth International was held at the University of Budapest with Ernest Mandel. This was yet another sign of the spectacular acceleration of democratization and moves towards political pluralism in Hungary. The conference was faithfully reported in the main opposition daily and in other daily newpapers. The Hungarian radio broadcast two interviews with Mandel about the Fourth International. During his stay in Budapest,
Mandel met Pál Demény, one of the last survivors of the Hungarian Republic of
Workers' Councils and a founder of the
Trotsky in our publications when the campaign against him was launched in the Russian Communist Party and in the Comintern. It was a matter of principle for us not to pass judgement without a serious study of the lexts. We could not make a decision on the basis of one-sided information. I will read with interest all the documents and books of Trotsky that you can provide. • What did you publish under Horthy's dictatorship? Our material corresponded 10 the cut off from the real life of the country, wanted to impose a suicidal leftist policy on us. They promoted the incory malle promoted the theory that the social democrats were social ing from the theory.
from
Demeny. Deménv. Tonin' time that is between 1919 and Lenin's time, that is between 1919 and 1923. After 1924 it degenerated. If we had submitted to its mechanical discipline that would have been more or less the end of the communist movement in Hungary.
demands of work in the unions and the Socialist Party. There were leaflets, circulars, pamphlets for propaganda and agitation, for propaganda and agration,
Marxist textbooks. Most of our publications were semi-legal, some illegal. We did not have a regular paper. This would have had to be illegal and the operation would have absorbed too many resources.
At the same time we adapted our organizational forms to the real situation in the country. For example, we did not call our base organizations "cells", since this would have automatically brought worse prison sentences for our comrades.
We called them "groups". For the same rcason we did not describe ourselves as the "Communist Opposition" bul as the
"left of the workers movement" or the
"left workers movement". But this did not mean that we did not function as a coherent, structured and discistructured and disci plined organization.
We kept out of the factional disputes that tore apart the
Hungarian communists in exile. Paradoxically, this meant that the official organ of the HCP as well as Moscow's publications did nol attack us very often or very hard. They considerd us as
"left social democrats". We ourselves tried to avoid pubourselves tried lo avoid public polemics with the HCP except on very rare occasions.
• Was the problem of repression that serious?
Certainly, and not only during the period of the white lerror that followed the fall of the Soviet Republic. But il lawed. [see box for historical references].
They were against the united-front tactic.
They wanted us to agitate for the dictatorship of the proletariat, at a time when the working class was on the defensive.
These policies were leading the CP into a dcad-end and a near complete paralysis.
We did not accept this. Nor were we preparca lo accept the financial blackmail whereby funds would be provided or cut off depending on whether or not one was off depending on wheiner of not one was prepared to slavishly follow
Moscow's diktats.
The slogans promoted first by Gerö - who was later up to his nock in the GPU's murders in Spain and the assassination of Trotsky - next by
Margaret Andez and finally by Rákosi, had no resonance in the country.
The result was an extreme weakening.
organizational organizationa.
The HCP had hardly 100 members in 1945 when Sovict
Iroops entercd the country. Our group had been able to bring together and organize five to ten times more, despite the fact that we relied entirely on our own resources.
In our view, the Comintern
8 was a rcal International in
• Were you accused of Trotskyism? Yes, but we did not consider ourselves to be Trotskyists. We believed that Trotsky was also responsible, along with Zinoviev, for the leftist policies of 1924-25, and for the theory of social fascism. You say that this is not true. I will study the documents.
But we refused to attack or criticize
International Viewpoint #172 • October 30, 1989
Hungarian Communist Party. We publish below an interview that was given to IV by fascists and pursued the policies flow-
They wanted to prevent us from working in the unions and the social democracy, which was still legal under the Horthy regime, when the CP was out-
HUNGARY
Historical notes ponderant influence in these for long periods.
From Bela Kun to Horthy: After the col lapse of the Habsburg Empire in Novem ber 1918, power in Hungary tell into the hands of Count Mikios Karolyl, who proved wholly unable to put an end to the instability in the country On March 21.
1919, in the revolutionary wave that fol lowed the defeat of the Central Powers and the birth of the Soviet regime in Hussia, power passed into the hands of the
Socialist Party and the newly created
Communist Party
The short lived Workers Councils
Republic, headed by the communist
Jeader Bela Kun, was militarily crushed by the Allies, who immediately afterwards conquered the Bavarian Soviet
Republic. This was the end of the hopes for an extension of the Russian revolu tion into Central Europe Bela Kun's govemment resigned in August 1, 1919. n the inter-war perlod, Hungary was under the military dictatorship of Admiral
Horthy, who unleashed heavy repres sian against the workers movement The
CP was forced into clandestinity Many of its leaders were arrested and others emigrated
The Stalinization of the Communist
Party: The process of subjecting the communist parties to the total control of the Russian CP was set In motion in the framework of a so-called "bolsheviza tion" in 1924, when the Comintern was still led by Zinoviev, At the Sixth congress of the Communist International In
1928, the theory of social fascism which claimed that fascism and social democracy were identical, was imposed on the sectons. This theory ruled out common action with reformist currents in the workers movement. Criticism of this ultra left and sectarian onentation, which ted a belief in an imminent revolution at a time when the workers movement was in a phase of retreat and weakening, was at the root of the first opposition groups in the communist partes
The Hunganan CP was led from Mos cow by, in succession, Ernå Gero, Mar garet Andez and Matyas Rakosi The communist leaders Laszlo Rajk and
Janos Kadar played a leading role in
Hungarian history after the Second got still worse under the fascist dictatorship (in the full sense of the term) that came in after the Nazis overthrew Horthy in 1944. Nonethtless we could survive and defend ourselves as long as we behaved politically and organizationally in a way suited to the real situation in the country. • You were yourself a victim of the repression under Horthy.
Yes. I was arrested for the first time in 1919 then again in 1921, and once more
World War.
The founding of the People's Republic: When the Hungarian Republic was proclaimed in 1946, after the end of the Nazi occupation and the invasion of the country by the Red Army, a gov emment of national unity was formed Atter 1947, with the onset of the Cold War, Hungary was transformed into a "People's Democracy" The mult-party system was replaced by the rule of a sin gie party after the fusion of the SocialIst Party and the CP The economy was completely nationalized, and 'assimilated to the Soviet model In 1949 the Hungarian People's Republic was formed and joined the Warsaw Pact In the framework of the new Stalinist regime, successive waves of repres sion, reaching their height above al between 1949 and 1953 were unleashed against opponents and critics, including communists Amang the latter category were Rak, who was exe cuted and Kadar
Ime Nagy and the 1956 revolution: On October 23, 1956, following on mobilizations by workers and intellectuals in solidanty with the strikes in Poz nan in Poland, Imre Nagy became head of the government The intervention of Soviet troops radicalized the popular mobilization, giving rise to the formation of workers councils co ordinated on a national level Nagy proclaimed Hungary's neutrality as a protest against the arval of Soviet troops and took part along with the workers leaders of the insurrection in the formation of a new communist party, the Hungarian Social Ist Workers Party
The demonstrations for democracy turned into an anti-bureaucratic political revolution. On Navember 4, the Soviet army attacked Budapest The second
Hunganan Soviet Rapublic was delini lively crushed, a month later after fierce resistance. The regime of Janos Kadar continued the repression mre Nagy was hanged along with Marshal Pal
Malater and the joumalist Miklos Gimes on July 16, 1958, after a secret trial.* later. I spent in all six years in prison under the dictatorship. • What was your main activity under the Horthy dictatorship?
We defended the workers' interests. We organized many strikes. We tried above all to work in the legal organizations of the workers movement - the unions, the friends of nature, the Esperantists and the cultural associations.
Sometimes, we were able to have a pre-
• What did your tendency do under fascism after 1944?
We gave priority to armed struggle, 1o sabotage, to protecting persecuted comrades, including CP Icaders such as Rajk and Kádár, and to protection of Jews threatened with extermination. Almost all the armed resistance in Budapest was lcd by us.
We were helped by the left-socialist Jewish organization, Hashomer Hatzair.
We created three legal businesses where we could provide for our own comrades, communist comrades, Soviet prisoners of war and Jews direclly threatened with extermination. The State of Israel recognizes us as among the "Just" who saved many human lives from the Nazi butchers. • What happened at the moment of the liberation of Budapest?
On November 6, 1944, the two commu nist factions fused. But it was impossible to do much given the intensity of the bombardment of Budapest. At the start of Feb ruary 1945, the Soviet army liberated the district in Budapest where I lived with my family. On February 13, 1945, Gábor Peter (later chief of the Stalinist political police) came to visit me.
He told me that Gerö, the number two in the party after Rákosi, had just arrived in Budapest from Moscow and wanted to meet me to discuss the future. I followed him. But the car took me straight to the local office of the political police. I was prisoner. I asked why I had been arrested. They replied: "You are more intelligent politically than us, and we therefore refuse to discuss with you. You are an opponent of Rákosi and you are under arrest in the name of the party." • For how long did the Stalinists keep you in prison?
Eleven years and eight months. I have therefore spent more than 18 years in prison, under Horthy and under the Stajinists. I was given two trials. Once in 1946, when I was sentenced to four years and six months for "espionage and collaboration with the dictatorship and the fascists."
This was an absurd sentence that showed that the accusers did not even believe their own slanders. But what is worse, this was when there was still a coalition government, and both the social democrats and the Smallholders Party' believed these Stalinist calumnies and repeated them in their press.
In 1953, 1 was sentenced again, this time for 10 years forced labour for "activities against the Constitution and agitation hos-
1. The Smallholders' Party was a popular peasant party immediaty ter he Second Wants War Bovement 9 that won the elections in 1947, beating the Hungarian immediately after the Second World War.
HUNGARY/ ISRAELI STATE against the Constitution and agitation hostile to the state." I was supposed to have carried out this "agitation" and these "activities" while I was stilll in prison! Note that "hostile activity" carried a heavier sentence than espionage. A truly nightmare universe.
I was released on February 13, 1956. My wife stayed in prison for four years, and my daughter for five. Subsequently I have been completely rehabilitated. First in 1957 1 was exonerated of the charges brought in the 1953 trtial, and then in 1989 of the 1946 charges. I received on these occasions a number of documents clearing my name. • What is your view of the 1956 revolution?
I was unable to take part personally, because I was seriously ill after my long years of captivity. It was a real popular revolution, carried out above all by young workers and supported by virtually all the workers of Budanest and the other bio cit-